In Russia there’s a ‘candy company’ called «Россия: щедрая душа» [Russia: The Generous Soul] that makes a lot of yummy chocolate products with astonishing names. The one above is named after today’s word (or perhaps it’s the other way around?) – «блаженство» [bliss]. This kind contains «молочный шоколад» [milk chocolate] and is delicious, just like Russian chocolate in general. Among other lovely names for chocolate there are, for example, «совершенство» [perfection] and «путешествие» [trip; journey; voyage] to choose from.

Today’s Word of the Week was chosen because a) there’s a milk chocolate bar named after it, and b) there’s a wonderful verb derived from it: «блаженствовать» [to be blissfully happy; to be in a state of bliss]. People don’t use it enough, even though there are plenty of moments during which one can ‘be in a state of bliss’, even in times of crisis like these. Perhaps it’s a spring thing – after almost five months of eternal snow I suppose anyone would feel «хоть немножко блаженства» [at least a little bit of bliss] from walking the streets without wearing enough layers of clothes to be able to get called on a polar expedition any given day… I’ve tried using the verb from time to time during the week in every day conversation, even though it’s tricky to know what kind of nouns to use it with, and which case to put them in. This has to do with the fact that I have not heard this word that much in common day speech. But you shouldn’t let a tiny detail like native speakers or their usage of their language when you like a word – and I like this word because of the combination «а» and «ж» with a stressed «е». In general, as soon as I mastered the difficult Russian sound «ж» I began pronouncing it everywhere, even where it’s not correct, just because I liked it so much (the story is similar with «з», which it took me two whole years to master, since there’s no ‘z’ sound in Swedish, and then for a couple of months I replaced all «с» with it. This led to some confusion. Now, fortunately, I have grown out of it). On Wednesday I said: «я блаженствую от того, что снег тает на улицах» [I’m blissfully happy because the snow is melting on the streets] and I think I got the message across. Then today, on Sunday, I asked a friend when we were taking a walk: «разве ты не блаженствуешь от того, что солнце светит и почти десять градусов на улице?» [aren’t you in a state of bliss because the sun is shining and it’s almost ten degrees Celsius outside?]. She nodded and then, a couple of sentences later, used the verb out of her own free will.

So where does «блаженство» [bliss] come from? What’s the history behind this word, how did it end up in the Russian language? To find out I got to use ‘my previous’ – «Этимологический словарь русского языка М. Фасмера» [M. Fasmer’s Etymological Dictionary of Russian Language]. This dictionary contains whole four volumes and tries to explain the etymology of most words in the Russian language. (Even in Russia this dictionary is rather hard to come by, but if you’re ready to lower you’re standards a little bit – who needs four volumes, anyway? – there are plenty of smaller etymological dictionaries sold in all book stores in Russia. I suppose they’re also sold in Russian book stores around the world. If you want one, then be brave and ask! Or go to www.gramota.ru and use it online there for free.) Even though the dictionary doesn’t have any seperate article for «блаженство» or the verb «блаженствовать», it’s easy to figure out that it must have the same roots as the adjective «блаженный» [blissfully; blessed; colloq. wacky]. In the dictionary it says that this adjective comes from the «церковнославянский» [Old Church Slavonic] verb «блажити», which means «нарицать блаженным», something that can be translated into to modern day Russian with «делать благим, хорошим» [to make good, nice]. After this much investigation I realized that the root of all of these words must be the noun «благо» [good; pl. benefits; blessings] (by the way, the dictionary says it comes from the old Russian word «болого», something I think anyone who took a course in Old Church Slavonic could’ve guessed by now. Anyone else who still remembers all of the rules on how the first «о» disappears with time and the second «о» turns into an «а»? I only remember it when I see it, like just now, but wake me up in the middle of the night and try me – I won’t be able to make an Old Slavonic word into a modern day Russian one for the life of me!).

«Благо» is a good word. Here are a couple of phrases with it:

«На благо человечества» – [for the good of mankind].

«Желаю вам всех благ!» – [I wish you all the best!].

«Ни за какие блага!» – [Not for anything in the world!]. 

«Считаю за благо (+inf.)» – [I think it’s best/wise to…]